Exploring the queer erotics of compressed time and impending mortality, “Stuntman” is a three hour live performance. Enclosed within four walls, I straddle a motorbike as it faces a dead-end ramp. Without turning the key in the ignition, the narrative is clear: if I drive, I crash. The flickering headlight remains the sole source of light as I thrust my clenched crotch down on the saddle. With one embodied stomp, I kickstart the engine and throttle it until it suddenly cuts. The space is now filled with a deeper understanding of the motorbike’s masculine undertones: the sweet purr; the rattling roar; the engine cuts; the spectre remains. Fatal fumes refuse to disperse as sight becomes hazed and bodies form a homogenous whole. Toxic masculinity penetrates.

Now I’m left to ask, why did I want to emulate toxic masculinity? But then I think of the words of Del LaGrace Volcano and I feel some form of clarity, even if only fleetingly:

“The feeling of comfort and relief I experienced when being perceived as male came as quite a shock to me because I was raised to believe in the power and glory of womanhood. There are some who accuse me of betraying “womanity” by inhabiting what looks and sounds like a male body. BOLLOCKS to that I say! I’m a Gender Terrorist, a walking, talking bomb in The Boys Club. Tick Tock. Tick Tock.”

— Del LaGrace Volcano The Drag King Book (1999)